


Libertades

by Kate_Monster



Category: The OA (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-12
Updated: 2017-02-13
Packaged: 2018-09-16 22:35:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9292484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kate_Monster/pseuds/Kate_Monster
Summary: One butterfly can change the world as we know it. Homer had the opportunity for freedom in Cuba – but is there any universe where he could find it?Now complete.





	1. Uno.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Homer has a realization about Hap and things come to a head.

UNO.

Hap points to the hotel room bed, and I obediently lie down as he settles in to the desk to work. I stare up at the ceiling for a long time, afraid to move from where he told me. But why?

I feel like I’m fighting with a million instincts inside me, and any one of them could lead me on a different path. The question is, which is the one that takes me back to where I want to be?

“Can I ask you a question?”

Hap turns in his chair, surprised by the idea. I’m a little surprised myself, because it was only in my head, and I’m not sure that I meant to say it out loud.

“I can’t stop you.”

There’s a lot of things he can stop me from doing if he wants, as it happens, and he certainly has done so more than enough times, but I take the remark as permission, because I think that’s what he meant.

“Why do you hate me?”

Now he’s really surprised. “Why do I what?”

“You hate me. Why?”

“I don’t hate you, Homer. I don’t hate any of you.” He doesn’t need to say that he tries to think of us as objects most of the time. But he can’t. Not me. With me, he fails. I know that, but what I don’t know is why.

“It’s different with me. I know it is. I see how you look at me.”

“I don’t know what you’re seeing, but I assure you. I don’t feel anything of the kind.”

It’s hardly the first time he’s lied to me, but it stings all the same. I want him to say it. I want the truth. I struggle to sit up, and he doesn’t order me to do otherwise. “See, I thought it was because of her. But it’s not. The more I think about it, you always hated me. More than any of the others.”

He pushes back his chair and gives a sigh of exhaustion. I have to admit, I’m quietly pleased that I’ve at least elicited a reaction from him. It’s more than I usually get, and it’s a power I’m not used to.

“Why in the world would you think that?”

“I think I know why.”

“Care to enlighten me?”

“Sure,” I say, feeling a little bolder than usual. “I think it started the first day you brought me here. There. Wherever. I think it’s because of what I am.”

“And what would that be?”

I’ve thought about this before, but I never thought I would say it to him. I lick my lips and take a deep breath. “You, you’re a doctor. That means you did well in school, I bet. You had to. Me, I’m an athlete. A jock. I know how these things work. And I think you hate me because someone like me hurt you a long time ago.”

“That’s… quite a theory.”

“It’s true.” I’m gaining steam now. “I’m paying for somebody else’s mistake in your eyes. They shouldn’t have done that. But look at me, Hap. I’m not them. I never hurt you like that.”

He takes a deep breath and fixes me with a hard stare. “I think it’s time for you to stop babbling and finish getting ready. You have a lot to do tonight and you’re going to have to blend in for it.”

It hadn’t even occurred to me until he said that. But he’s right. I haven’t had a real bath in… well, in years. I try to keep myself clean, at least as much as possible under the circumstances, but to him, I must be greasy, smelly, more like an animal than a person. And once I get cleaned up, maybe he’ll be willing to consider what I’m trying to say to him. To think of me as a person, to really see Homer Roberts, and not whatever ghost from his past he sees when he looks at me.

He leaves me alone in the room to shower after informing me that there’s a microphone in my shirt. Figures. I finger the fabric until I find it, stitched into the collar. He won’t let me get away. I’m stupid to think that I would have a chance.

I leave the water running when I step out of the shower. It gives me time to look around the bathroom. Through a crack in the door, I see him working in the next room. I methodically put my clothes back on – it feels so odd, putting on new clothing, I’ve gotten used to wearing the same thing for so long. The room is steaming up from the shower and I breathe deeply, hoping that the steam will clear my head and give me an idea that will actually work here.

There’s a table right next to the bathroom with a pad of paper. Hotel stationary. He moved the pen out of my reach – of course he did – but maybe I can find something later, some way to leave a note. I have to take the chance. I carefully, quietly rip the top sheet of paper off and fold it up, stuffing it in my pocket, because you never know. I put the notepad back exactly as I found it, and he never turns around to notice what I’m doing.

I finally turn the water off and let myself stand there for a long time, staring in the mirror. I barely recognize myself, but I see the eyes I remember so well. I thought I would look worse than I do. Maybe he’s right, maybe I can still manage to convince a girl to go to bed with me. I guess we’ll see.

I plod out into the room, and he acknowledges my return with a quiet, stern nod. He points to the bed, but I don’t move. He looks up at me quizzically.

“Something you need?”

Something about the question gives me pause.

Yes. Yes, there is something I need.

Why am I cooperating with him?

I know I don’t have the strength I used to have. He’s a free man who moves around and exercises and eats regular food. I’ve spent years as a prisoner, and though I’ve tried to keep my body in shape, I don’t know if it can do the things it used to. But I did take martial arts when my dad made us, because he said I needed to know how to handle myself in combat, he thought it would make me a better football player. And I wasn’t the best at it, but I knew how to take a guy down. And I definitely know how to tackle, even though I was a running back. It’s been years since I’ve done any of it, but my body still knows how.

All of this flashes through my mind in an instant, and in the same moment, I think my intentions become clear to him. I see the alarm rise on his face as he realizes the dangerous thoughts that are pulsing through my mind. He sees me sizing him up, he sees my animal instinct rising to the surface, and he leaps to his feet.“Homer. Sit down,” he says, the warning evident in his voice.

But I hear something else I’m not used to from him – fear.

Now I know, he’s scared of me. He’s always been scared of me.

It feels delicious.

I want to show him that he was right.

I launch myself at the lamp on the table and in seconds, it’s swinging through the air, crashing into his face. I’ve become the monster he always feared, the bully he tried to control. And it scares me even more than it scares him, but my adrenaline takes over, and all I can think of is beating him into submission and making my escape.

He screams, and I know it’s loud enough to attract attention, so I need to win this fight, fast. I swing the lamp at him again, but he blocks it, shoving back at me, kicking up as I try to roll out of the way. I trip over his leg and go sprawling backwards. Before I know it, he’s pummeling my face, and I see blood flying to the side.

“You stupid little asshole,” he says, sitting back. I struggle to try to sit up, but I’m in pain. Before I can make it, he’s got the lamp in hand and is standing over me. “You couldn’t let things go smoothly just once.”

I put my hands over my face, expecting a blow that doesn’t come. I open my eyes and realize that he’s grabbed something else. My heart sinks.

He has a revolver.

“No,” I whisper. I kick, trying to bring myself to my feet, but I don’t have the strength now.

“You didn’t think I’d come prepared?” he asks. “You didn’t think I knew there was a chance that I might have to end you on this trip?”

“Don’t-“

“You never gamble with money you’re not willing to lose,” he says. “You’re right. I’m smart. And I thought you might be, too. But I guess I was wrong.”

“I’m not-“

But there’s nothing else for me to say, he’s made up his mind now and I don’t have any choice in the matter. I’m too much of a risk, and when he pulls the trigger, I know the little boy inside him feels a dark satisfaction at finally taking out one of his aggressors.

The last thought that floods through my mind as I sink into a red haze is one of relief.

_Finally._

_I’m free._


	2. Dos.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Homer capitulates and finds his own kind of victory.

DOS.

He lets me lie down on the bed for a little while when we first get to the hotel room.

When I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror as I sit down, I’m ashamed by what I see. Cringing from the sunlight while staring and trying to take everything in, trembling slightly from the overwhelming emotion of being out, and seeing a world that I’d almost forgotten still existed. I know I’m pathetic, but I can’t help it. It’s too much. 

“We have hours,” he assures me. He doesn’t close the bedroom door, of course, he’s not stupid enough to leave me unsupervised, even in my pitiful state. He moves around the room, taking anything that looks like it could be moved, and carrying it into the living room before leaving me alone, lying on the bed, the sweet Havana air drifting in through the open window.

Once he’s out of sight, I take a silent gasp of the fresh air, closing my eyes and tasting it. It’s refreshing and almost hypnotic. It calms me. I spotted his gas machine in the luggage he carried in, I know he could use it on me at any time, and I need something healthy in my lungs while I still can.

But it doesn’t work. The breath triggers something in my lungs and I fall into a coughing fit, rolling myself into a ball on the bed as I’m racked with a combination of coughs and repressed sobs. After a moment, he runs back into the room, concerned, his hand on the doorframe as he studies me. He leaves and returns in a moment with a sweaty cold can of cola, which he opens and hands to me as I uncurl my body and try to regain my breath.

I know I should thank him, but why? How can you thank someone who’s ripped you away from everything you’ve ever known? What do you say? Instead, I sip from the can, the first real soda I’ve had in years, cool syrupy dark fizz buzzing down my throat, and it tastes incredible.

He rubs his hand up and down my back as the coughs subside. I can feel tears nipping at my eyes and I try to hold them in, but I can’t. One escapes and tumbles down my cheek.

His hand stops moving on my back as he looks at me. I want to sink into the bed from shame. His finger rises up to gently wipe the tear off my face.

Inexplicably, I turn towards him and he takes me as I collapse into his arms. I hate myself, but I can’t help it. He takes care of everything for me, and as confusing as it is, I’m suddenly realizing that I need him to. I can’t function without him making choices for me, showing me what I need to do. I’m not a person anymore, I’m just Hap’s toy, and for the first time, I realize that maybe he really does love me.

His arms are strong and comforting. It’s not sexual. Don’t think that for a second. There’s no pleasure in it, only comfort and care. Relief. I finally release my tears, and he holds me as I cry into his chest, heaving, for what feels like hours but is probably no more than a minute. No one has touched me in years, and I forgot what it was like to touch another body. Even if it’s his.

When I finally pull back and lift my face up, he brushes my hair back from my head. His hand stays on the side of my face as I look up at him. The look on his face is different.

“What do we need to do?” I ask softly.

Hap explains the plan, his palm still resting aside my head as he talks and as I take in every word. I don’t like it, it terrifies me, but I know that I have to do whatever he wants if I want to try to get what I want.

What _do_ I want?

“I will help you,” I say carefully, tears stinging my eyes even as I say the words. “I will do whatever you want me to do. Not just today. Every day. I will work with you. You will have my cooperation. I only want two things.”

“I didn’t say this was a negotiation.”

“Only two.”

“Name them, and we’ll see,” he says, uncertain. His hand drops to the bed, but he’s genuinely curious as to what I’m going to ask.

I hold up a shaking index finger. “Real food downstairs. For all of us. No more pellets.”

Hap recoils. “I have a budget, Homer.”

“That’s why they invented ramen, Hap.”

He actually releases a chuckle at that, much to the surprise of both of us. “It might not be so good for your health.”

“So maybe we’ll die.” I give him a defiant look over my raised finger.

He shrugs, conceding to me. “Okay. We’ll figure something out. What’s your second condition?”

I add a second raised finger. This is the important one. “You move Prairie in with me.”

He’s more startled by that request, though he probably shouldn’t be. “I see.”

“It’s for the good of the research. She and I need to work together. We can’t do it through the glass.”

“You’ve done fine this far.”

“And we’re stalled.” Never mind the fact that I want to know what her glowing golden hair feels like in person, and let her run her delicate hands over my chest. That I don’t want to spend another night separated from her by plexi-glass, longing for what’s on the other side, just inches away from my fingertips.

Hap still looks hesitant, and for the first time, I realize that maybe he doesn’t view me as just a captive, or even as a son. Maybe he views me, just a little bit, as a rival. And that maybe I’ve been reading him wrong this whole time, and I need to be extremely careful with how I play this right now.

“Anything you want,” I say as quickly and quietly as I can. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know. Let’s work together.”

Hap presses his lips together and stares at the floor before heaving a deep sigh and nodding. “All right. You win. Real food, within the budget, and I’ll put you back in with Prairie when we get home.”

I shake my head, correcting him. “She moves in with me.” My cell is nicer. It’s upstream.

“I’ll take down the wall,” he says. I feel a thrill I haven’t felt in years striking in my heart. I’ll finally be able to touch her. “Now let’s get down to business.”

My pact with the devil is made.

As overwhelmed as I am, it isn’t as hard as I thought it would be to pull off Hap’s assignment. He treats me to Cuban rum and a chicken dish. Two things I never thought I would ever have. The tension falls away from me as the rum clouds my brain, and I steel myself for what’s ahead. He shares a cigarette after dinner to help me relax, and the music sends me into a trance, making it that much easier to get ready for what I have to do.

It’s been a long time since I’ve seduced anyone, but I’m not exactly a virgin, it’s starting to come back to me with the strong rum and the seasoned chicken and the pungent air, and before too long, I have her up in my room, writhing beneath me, as I squeeze my eyes shut and picture Prairie’s face and dissolve in pent up pleasure. And then the door opens and it all goes pleasantly black, and the next thing I know, I’m up in the sky, back in his plane, heading home again.

Hap praises me profusely for a job well done, and points to the floor beside me, where my first peace offering sits. “Cuban coffee,” he shouts over the propeller. “Picked it up just for you right before we left.”

I didn’t know how much I missed coffee. It’s steaming hot and strong and sweet, and I close my eyes, savoring the long-forgotten feel of caffeine rushing into my veins, trying to ignore the new unconscious captive, who I know is restrained in the seat behind us.

“You’re a good boy, Homer,” Hap says. “We’re going to make a good team.”

I stare out the window, squinting out against the bright sunrise. It still hurts my eyes.

Hap is a liar. I’m not a good boy. Not anymore.

But I’m a boy who’s going to finally get what I want. And in a way, I suppose, it’s almost freedom.


	3. Tres.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A familiar face brings Homer an unexpected opportunity.

TRES.

I thought being outside in the world again would feel like the future, but instead, it’s like I’ve stepped into the past. I feel like I’m on a movie set. The cars are all classic antiques, the people all brightly dressed. I know it’s because we’re in another country, but it all seems so strange and overwhelming to me.

And yet I freeze cold in my tracks when I notice a familiar face in the bar. Here? It’s not possible. In Cuba? Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe I’ve been so isolated that I’m trying to map familiar faces from my past onto this strange, new world that I’ve stumbled upon 

But it looks _just_ like him.

And it would make sense that he of all people could be here. I have to take the chance. Which means that I have to get him alone.

I duck down when he passes, avoiding his eyes. With the wrong timing, the wrong tactics, everything could be lost. But if I play this right…

It’s ten minutes later that I finally get my chance. I see him edge around the bar, just out of our sight, and I know that if I don’t go now, I’ll be trapped forever.

“I need another drink.”

Before Hap can object, I heave myself out of the chair to head for the bar. As I move away, I notice his amusement. Just more bizarre behavior from me, but in total compliance with what he asked me to do tonight.

At the bar, I squeeze in at the end, just within his eyeshot, just within range of my target. I look to the side, casting my face down, my head turned away from our table.

“Vega.”

The smartest high school quarterback I ever played with, my Cuban-American friend from so long ago, looks up in surprise. “HoRo?” He breaks into a wide, familiar, crooked grin. “I can’t believe it! Dude!” It looks like he’s going to go in for an embrace, but my chilly look scares him off. I feel guilty as I see his face fall briefly, wondering what he’s done to offend me, but there isn’t time for that. “What the hell are you doing here? Yo, everyone thought you, like, vanished off the face of the planet.”

If he only knew. “Vega,” I say in a low voice. “Remember the state championship game our junior year? Against Tech?”

He thinks for a moment, and I see it coming back to him. “How could I forget?”

“That last play?” He nods, looking uncertain, even though the memory itself is a happy one. I take a deep breath, and it all comes out in a rush. “I told you to trust me. And you did. You believed me.” The running back telling the quarterback what to do. Overruling the coach. Unheard of on some teams, but for us? It worked.

“And you made the winning touchdown with seconds to spare.” In one blissful moment, we operated together in perfect sync, and we were heroes for it.

The memory is sweet, but the reality is bitter. “I need you to trust me again right now. I’m in danger, real danger. So are you, if you don’t do exactly what I say.”

This is not at all what he expected on his carefree vacation in Havana, and I can see in his eyes that he’s already couple of drinks in to his night, but he’s a smart guy. Vega gives me a curt nod. He knows I wouldn’t prank him, not like this, not after so long.

“Can I help you, sir?”

“Yeah…” I try to remember what I was just drinking. I can’t. I can’t even remember what I like to drink. “Can I just have one of those?” I point at a beer sitting on the bar. The bartender moves away to get it and I glance downward, away from Vega. Now that I know I have his full attention, I have to act normal. I cast another glance to the side to check our table, and it looks like Hap has noticed that I’m in a conversation with someone he can’t see. Dammit, I have to act fast, and I don’t know if I can even act that fast anymore.

“Listen,” I whisper urgently, just loud enough for Vega to overhear. “Someone is coming over here, and he’s gonna lie to you. Don’t believe him. But act like you do. He’s a very bad man. I need your help, but it won’t work if he knows you don’t believe him.”

“Okay,” Vega says. From the corner of my eye, I see him also glance away, covering the fact that we’ve been conversing. There were so many dumb guys on our high school squad, guys who wouldn’t be able to keep up in a volatile situation like this, but not Vega. He’s the only person I want here right now, the only one I would trust to try and help me find a way out of this invisible prison, and he’s here. His presence here can only be a stroke of fate.

“Everything okay, son?” Hap asks as he approaches us.

“Just getting my drink,” I mumble, staring at my shoes.

“You’re gonna need some money for that,” he says, his voice oozing with paternal affection. “Now, you didn’t think about that, did you?”

He expects a response. I swallow. “No.”

“Well. Good thing we got you covered.” He leans against the bar between Vega and me. “You got this far on your own, though. I’m proud of you. That’s a big step.” If I didn’t know any better, he might sound sincere.

The bartender slides the beer over to me and they converse brightly for a moment. As I sip the beer, savoring the malt and the familiar twinge of alcohol, I glance over his shoulder at Vega, who is eavesdropping on this exchange with appropriate concern. My brain whirls, trying to figure out how to work this sliver of luck into a victory, without endangering the person who represents the only hope I’ve had in years.

Then, before I know what’s happening, he’s turned to Vega, his expression congenial, as he says something too low for me to hear. So, he did notice that we were talking.

Vega is exposed. He’s dangerously close to Hap’s talons. I feel a chill in my blood, or maybe that’s just the breeze from the ocean, but I try to stay calm. My friend, my old teammate, my savior listens with quiet concern, then nods in polite agreement. 

For a moment I’m struck with fear that even Vega believes my enemy, that I’m going to be trapped forever, but then I remember. He’s doing exactly what I told him to do.

“Come,” Hap says gently, taking me by the shoulder and leading me back towards our table. I avoid the urge to glance back at Vega. I don’t want Hap to perceive that there’s any connection between us, that Vega is anything more than a stranger at the bar, and I don’t need to look back to know that by now, my old friend has figured out enough.

I can’t look back as our food arrives either, and he leans over to cut the meat like I’m a small child, or at least a damaged man. I’m overwhelmed by the taste of real, delicious, fresh food, and he offers me a cigarette to calm myself. Moments later, the music changes, and while we’re both captivated by her playing, and I know before he tells me that she’s the one he wants, she’s like us, an angel.

This is it. If I’m going to get another moment without him, it’s going to be during this hypnotic music. My heart is pounding so loud as I slip my fingers into my pocket that I can’t believe he doesn’t turn around. The blank piece of paper from the hotel room stationary pad. It might work. I don’t have time to write a message on it like I had thought I might. But it will tell Vega where I’m staying, and now he knows that I need help. I hope that’s enough for him to put the rest of the pieces together, but I don’t have any better options right now.

Carefully, slowly, so as not to attract Hap’s attention, I fold the paper over and over in my pocket, forcing it into a triangle. I glance around the room, until I find Vega. He’s leaning against the far wall with his drink, his head bobbing to the music, but he must have been watching me out of the corner of his eye, because he returns my glance.

I only have one chance. I take a moment to line up my shot, studying Hap and his line of sight. I need to go sideways, I need to clear at least one table so that Vega doesn’t attract any unwanted attention when he completes the play. I need to avoid the waiters and the other patrons. I need no one to see me right now, except for the one person who can help me. And it all has to go perfectly.

I breathe a silent prayer, make a mental cross, then flick the paper to the floor, just like a game of tabletop football. But it doesn’t travel far enough, and my heart stops as it slides to rest under a chair at the next table. Too close. Horrified, I look to Hap to see if he noticed my most rebellious act, but he’s still captivated by the music.

My seat neighbor, someone I’d written off as a danger to me like every other stranger in the room, doesn’t react at all when Vega walks up behind him and, with a quick apology, retrieves the paper. I glance back to the guitar player, trying to act as normal as I can, but look back once again a moment later to try and gauge my friend’s reaction.

His brow furrows as he studies the unfolded paper. _Come on, dude._ Ever so slowly, I cock an eyebrow at him. _Figure it out._

A moment later, he nods. His eyes fix me with lasers. _I got you, man._

Now all I can do is wait.

I’ve gotten better at waiting over the years. It’s hard to do anything else when you’re trapped in a cage. And it’s easier to do when the music is beautiful, and until you’re rescued, you’re still a prisoner with a mission. I have hope now, though, and it changes me, puts a lift in my step as I comply with Hap’s orders to invite the guitarist, Renata, up to my room.

Even knowing what I just did, I still hate myself.

We’ve barely started making out when I hear a commotion in the next room. Even though her hands feel so, so good on my chest and stomach and snaking down into my pants, I still pull away and turn to the door as the Cuban police enter, the PNR, with their black berets and guns. I’m frightened at first, but I forcefully remind myself that this is exactly what I wanted, and they’re here to save me.

One of them speaks English. “We are looking for… Homer,” he says.

“That’s me,” I say, sliding off the bed and quickly buttoning my pants back up. If Renata is embarrassed, she doesn’t say anything. She’s certainly confused, but she has no idea just how lucky she is – how lucky we both are.

Later, Vega will remind me that his cousin is in the PNR, which is why he was able to engage them so swiftly to my rescue. It’s his Cuban cousin who makes sure that Renata is escorted safely home to her father’s house even as Hap is being arrested, and who makes sure that they secure lodging for me while contacting my family. My own father is there with my passport in hand in less than twenty-four hours, and Hap is deported into the custody of the CIA while their agents question me for hours, Dad waiting anxiously outside at my request. I want them to have all the information I can give them, but I don’t want Dad to know. I’m not ready yet.

Vega is there at the Havana airport when my father and I depart on our flight to Canada, and I thank him and his cousin profusely for saving me.

“Just returning that favor, from junior year,” he says, squinting at me with half a smile.

“You’re the hero this time,” I reply.

“I don’t know about that,” is his response. “I think you’re still up there.” Am I, though?

It isn’t until we’re safely back in the States that my father finally tells me. I’ve been pestering him the whole time for updates. I may be rescued, but I don’t feel safe. The others, they’re part of me, and without knowing that they’re okay, I feel hollow and numb. Especially Prairie, my brave Prairie, my love Prairie. And I know before they sit me down on my second day home that things are not okay.

“They found the mine,” my father says slowly. “Everything you told them was true. The cameras, the gas, the cages.”

“And the others?” My voice rises and cracks. “Rachel, Scott… Prairie?”

He shakes his head.

“What? Are they dead?”

“They left. In a hurry.”

I don’t understand. Hap never made it back, so… “They escaped?”

My father spreads his hands. “I don’t know. They just aren’t there. It’s as if someone found out about the arrest, and moved them quickly.”

The color had already drained from my face and now I feel as though I may faint. “They’re still out there.”

“Homer, are you okay?”

Of course I’m not okay. They can’t understand. My hands are shaking. My breath is coming in shallow gasps. I made it out, I’m safe, but I’ll never see the others, never see Prairie again. I don’t know who has them or where they took them or what they’re doing. I’ll never know what the rest of the movements are, never know what was the real purpose of our existence as human guinea pigs.

The agents show me pictures of the empty mine and I tell them as much as I can. He pleads guilty, and I know it’s to avoid having me on the stand testifying. When it’s all over, I talk my father out of accompanying me on the trip. I need to do this by myself.

I don’t know why he agreed to see me. The conversation is no doubt being recorded, which he knows as well as I do. He slides into the seat and lifts a phone. I press my own phone to my ear.

“I knew you would come.” His control over me, even from behind a prison wall, sends a shiver down my spine.

“Where are they, you bastard?”

“I don’t know who you’re talking about.”

“Don’t play dumb with me.”

Hap sighs. “I told you, Homer. The work is bigger than either you or me. It goes on.”

My fingers tighten around the receiver.

“Better men than you have interrogated me about this, for hours,” he reminds me. I know this, of course. “I have nothing else to say.”

My palm crashes against the glass and he jumps back. I revel in his moment of unnecessary fear. “You’ll never be free again.”

“Neither will you.”

I know deep down that he’s right. As long as I feel the intense guilt for securing my own freedom at the expense of Scott’s and Rachel’s and Prairie’s, my soul will always be eight thousand feet below the ground, in an artificial terrarium, pressing my fingers against the glass and studying her golden tresses as they fall over the pillow.

And I’ll spend the rest of my life wishing I had never noticed Vega in the bar that day.

 


	4. Cuatro.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Homer sees a chance at freedom, and grabs for it.

CUATRO.

I tear through the hotel, my shirt flapping in the breeze, terrified that he’s right behind me.

I skid around the corner and there it is. The thing I was looking for.

The business center.

I reach for the door and pull it towards me.

Nothing. It’s stuck.

I start to panic even more. I need a room key. Of course Hap wouldn’t give me a room key. The prisoner locked in the tower doesn’t get a key.

A moment later, a pepper-haired man comes up behind me and I step aside out of instinct. He inserts his key in the door and it beeps, admitting him into the room. Without a word, I follow him in, trying to calm myself, to remember what it’s like to act normal, like any other stupid American traveler who left his key behind.

I slide into the chair at the computer in the back corner, positioning myself so that I’m not visible to anyone passing by the window. This will _have_ to be one of the first places he checks. That means I may only have a matter of minutes, if not seconds.

I swallow back fear at the thought, and pull up the browser. It’s slow. Maddeningly slow. I remember that I’m in Cuba and they barely have internet here. Still, I don’t wait for the home page to load, instead I fire up the login page for my old Gmail account.

It takes me three tries to log in. I can barely remember my convoluted password from so many years ago, but finally it comes to me after a couple misfires, and I’m in.

Gmail is not happy with my long absence and starts prompting me to update my settings. I don’t know how to even start to explain to my email server where I’ve been. All I can do is dismiss, dismiss, dismiss.

I have thousands of new messages. Most of them look like spam. I’m sure there are real people buried in here, the ones trying desperately to contact me in the only way they know, not realizing that I’m off the grid and out of play. But for now, I search the new interface and manage to get my old Gchat app launched. I anxiously scan the list of names for anyone who can talk right now. I don’t have time to wait.

And there he is. Active. Online. Now.

Somewhere, probably back in the United States, my brother sits, bored, at a computer. He has no idea that I’m so far away, and that I need him badly. My heart drops into my stomach as I launch a window with his name and click into it:

HOROBO1989: _Troy._

The response comes back almost instantly, much to my intense joy and relief.

TroyKRoberts: _Who the hell is this n why are u using my bro’s account?_

I can hear the irritation in his abbreviated voice and it almost makes me smile, but there’s no time.

HOROBO1989: _it's me. it's homer. i swear._

TroyKRoberts: _This isn't funny_

HOROBO1989: _fuck no it isn’t. I’m alive I was kidnapped and i need your help. Please please._

I glance over my shoulder, expecting him to burst in at any time. Where do I even start?

TroyKRoberts: _This better not be a joke if ur Homer prove it_

Prove it? I rack my brain for something that only Troy and I would know.

HOROBO1989: _We shared a bed at Disney and you wet the bed. I never told mom and dad._

TroyKRoberts: _OK ok ok. Where r u?_  

HOROBO1989: _i don't know. i think cuba. The others are still trapped. In a cage in a mine._

TroyKRoberts: _Who others? What kind of cage? where r u in Cuba?_

HOROBO1989: _Havana I think? doesn't matter. won't be here much longer._ _the mine is not here._

TroyKRoberts: _Who kidnapped u?_

He’s going too fast. But he’s right. I need to focus on the important info.

HOROBO1989: _we call him hap. don't know real name. pilot. maybe anesthesiologist. there are 4 ppl who need to be rescued. Maybe 5 soon._ _look in northeast. other prisoners are scott prairie n rachel. Been there for yrs. We flew hours to get to cuba at least but don’t know how long cuz he knocked me out. Will go back soon._

TroyKRoberts: _Are u ok?_

HOROBO1989: _NO_

TroyKRoberts: _Ur scaring me_

There’s a rattle at the door. Now, we’re both scared.

HOROBO1989: _hes here_ _i have to go. Help us. Love u_

Somehow, miraculously, I manage to hit the logout button, clear the cache, and shut the window just in time as Hap bursts into the business center. He freezes in his tracks as he glances from me to the pepper-haired man.

“There you are. Did you get your article printed?” he asks me, somehow mustering a casual, friendly tone.

“Does it look like I got an article printed?” I manage to growl.

He shoots me a chilling, warning look. “Why don’t I try, then?”

I obediently rise from the chair, and he moves around me to crouch over the desk and open the browser. It only takes him a moment to check the history. He turns around and stares at me with shock, realizing that whatever I’ve done, the damage is complete, and there’s not much he can do about it.

“Doesn’t look like it’s working for you, either,” I say in an even tone.

Hap looks from me to the computer and back. He slides into the seat and clicks around on the browser’s settings, trying to find a way to identify what I managed to do. I lean against the wall, staring at the ground, waiting for him to finish, because there’s nothing else I can do. If I try to run, he’ll stop me. After a couple of minutes, he closes the browser and stands. “Let’s go then."

He takes me lightly by the arm as we walk back to the elevator. He isn’t going to let me out of range, not again, not after that. He waits until we’re back in the room to turn on me, his rage slowly slipping out and walling me into the corner.

“What did you do?” he demands.

“Nothing.” Inside, even though he has me cornered, I feel glee welling up inside me. Troy knows I’m alive. Troy knows I was kidnapped and who I’m with. I’m not so alone anymore. Whether or not he can do anything with it, at least he knows. He can tell someone. Anyone.

“You realize you just put everyone’s lives at risk? Rachel’s? _Prairie’s_?”

“I didn’t,” I insist. “I didn’t do anything.”

Hap walks over and without warning, slaps me on the cheek. He’s never hit me before. It hurts. My hands fly protectively to my cheek as I reel from the impact. I stagger back, staring up at him defiantly, showing him that nothing he can do will ever get this thing out of me, no matter what he does to me. I could hit him back. I’m still strong enough. But it wouldn’t do me any good. Not now.

“Go finish getting ready,” is all that he says. “Dinner’s in an hour.”

I’m shaking so badly at dinner that I can barely manage to eat any of the food they put in front of me. He makes me take a cigarette, promising that it will calm me down, but I don’t want to be calmed down right now. The first mouthful leaves me in a coughing fit and I don’t want any more. I don’t want anything to do with him.

I have a brother. I just spoke to him. My brother knows where I am right now.

He sends me to talk to her after she plays, but who would be interested in me looking the way that I do? Half my face still feels inflamed from where he hit me. My clothes don’t fit, I know I look tired and stressed. She strokes my hair gently and tells me to go home and get some sleep.

My failure is unacceptable, but Hap doesn’t know what else to do. “We’ll try again tomorrow night.”

“It’s no use, Hap,” I say, staring at the floor of the hotel room. “You’re not her type and neither am I.”

“You are exactly her type, and you’re going to try again,” he says.

“Maybe she has a boyfriend.”

For a moment, I think he’s going to hit me again. Then he relaxes. “Tomorrow night you’re going to find out.”

But she isn’t there the next night. Or the night after that.

Three days in Cuba now, and I see the tension growing on his face as it becomes more and more evident that only thing that either of us has accomplished is whatever I did on the computer, which he doesn’t have a way to trace. My victory in the face of his failure makes it even sweeter, but I can’t let him know, and I don’t.

He finally gives up and we return to the airport. When we first came in, he smuggled me into the luggage and I’m pretty sure he tipped off the customs agents to let us through. Going out, though, he isn’t as lucky, and from my muffled position in the trunk, I hear the clicking of the locks on the outside. My breath catches as the agents blink at me in surprise.

“Sir, you are going to have to come with me,” one of them says to Hap.

They escort me to another room and demand my papers in accented English. All I can do is laugh. “Papers?”

“What is your name?” one agent asks, glancing at a report in his hands.

“If that says Homer Roberts, that’s me,” I say. “I’d prove it, but that guy you just took away confiscated my ID a long time ago. Along with just about everything else.”

He sets the paper on the table and I see black and white photos of myself, no doubt provided by my family, with the word “ _secuestrado_ ” across the top in large letters.

It takes a week to sort the issue out between the Cuban and American governments. They house me in a prison barracks during that time, which doesn’t bother me. The guards seem sensitive to my situation and are gentle with me, the food is better than what I’ve been used to the past few years, and I’m on the phone with Troy by the third day.

“Homer! Oh, God, is it really you? Are you okay?”

My fingers curl around the phone as I smile to myself. “It’s me, man. I’m fine, but they won’t tell me anything. There are others-“

“The others, yeah, yeah. You really don’t know? It’s all over the news here. They got ‘em.”

“Alive?”

“Yeah.”

Relief floods through me as happy tears spring to my eyes. It’s the best word I’ve ever heard in my life. “They’re okay?”

“I mean, they all look like hell, I guess you probably do, too, but yeah. Dude, we’re getting tons of media requests. Dad was even gonna try to come get you, but they told him to stay put, so he’s spending all his time with the lawyer trying to get your stuff sorted out.”

“Media?” I feel overwhelmed at the thought. I can barely get through a conversation with my own brother right now.

“Oh yeah. Don’t talk to anyone. The lawyer said we can get a lot of money for your story if we do it right.”

“I won’t.” Don’t talk. That part ought to be easy enough.

I’m home by the end of the week, and Troy is right, the reporters are there when I emerge, swarming the baggage claim area, which we brush through since I don’t have any possessions to claim, and even though I shove past them straight into the car with the help of the cops, I see the headlines that night, Kidnap Mine Hero Returns from Cuba, pictures of my pale, shocked face next to the faces of my longtime companions and brief updates about where they are.

I can’t get on the phone with Prairie for another week. Her family is keeping her in isolation. I suspect she’s in a mental hospital, though they won’t confirm it to the press, or even to my family, though my father presses her mother for details on the phone. And it’s two months before I finally see her in person, backstage at the talk show interview the families arranged together.

Her parents refuse to leave her side, and though we embrace tightly, tears streaming down our faces, we don’t get any time to talk privately or process what happened, and there are cameramen surrounding us to catch our emotional reunion, images that will be used to drive up their ratings in salacious commercial advertisements.

And she’s different. Something has changed. I can see it, even if no one else can. She’s happy to see me, but her eyes are dulled, her face is slack, and I know they’ve got her on medication. I have a sinking feeling as I watch her interview segment on the monitors from backstage, and I see how her parents do all the talking for her, how they control her responses. The spirited, enlightened girl I knew is deeply muted by their fierce love for her, by their well-intentioned desire to help her, their need to keep her in their control.

I realize, for the first time, that she’s probably spent her entire life being a prisoner. Of course. No wonder she handled it so well when we were in there.

We keep in touch after that. There’s no option not to. I have to have her in my life, but I know her messages are monitored, and I know she isn’t free to say what she wants to say to me, if she even still could. I want to be a bigger part of her life, but she’s not free to make that decision with me, and there’s no realistic way for us to be together, not the way that we want.

Almost every night, I lie awake wishing we were back in the mine deep underground, where at least we could see each other, even if we couldn’t touch. When we were free to say what we wanted to each other, and had all the time we wanted to do it.

I would never admit it, I know how it sounds, and I feel guilty at the thought, but I miss our imprisonment. I truly do.

All this time, I thought I wanted freedom, but now? I don’t think I ever considered what freedom really meant to us.

It never occurred to me that Prairie and I could never truly be free.

Not if my idea of freedom only meant trying to go back to where we were before.


	5. Cinco.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Homer struggles to find a moment of freedom in an hour of fear.

CINCO.

The drink tastes sickeningly sweet to my stale, dusty tongue. Maybe it’s really that sweet. Maybe I just don’t know what it means anymore to taste something sweet. The alcohol is strong and after two sips I feel it swirling just behind my forehead, my breath coming in shallow gulps, or is that panic? I don’t know anything anymore.

“It’s okay,” he says, encouraging me. “If you finish that one, we’ll get you another. You have important work tonight, and I need you to be relaxed for it.”

Relaxed. Is that even possible? I can’t imagine what the innocents must see when they look at me. My skin is pale and clammy, my hair is shaggy, my eyes must be darting furtively around the room, how can I possibly blend in to a world I never belonged to in the first place when I no longer even have a place to belong? But the sweet, powerful drink is calming me down whether I like it or not, and I know that if I refuse it, he’ll find some other way to get me to bend to his will, so there’s no point in resisting.

“What do you want for dinner?” he asks, tapping the menu in front of me. My look must tell him all the confusion and hesitation I’m feeling, because he gives me a wry smile. “This is a treat. Like I said. You need to be ready and you’re going to eat a good meal first. What do you like to eat?”

How many years have we spent together, under one roof, and he has no idea what I like to eat, because he makes decisions for me? Even I barely know what I like to eat anymore, not with so many choices in front of me. And I know that whatever I eat could very well be my last real meal. I may never get to choose again after I make this decision. Maybe I want nothing. Maybe I want everything.

“Shall I order for you?”

“No.” It’s a stronger, more forceful refusal than I intended, but it drives the point home. “Wait.”

“Okay,” he says, almost amused, settling back in his chair and studying his own menu again. I hate him for his amusement at my pitiful attempt at rebellion. I hate him for being free. I want to rebel more, to prove to him that he doesn’t control me, that he may own my body but he will never own my soul, but my choices are as limited as he is powerful.

“I’m a fan of the pollo platter,” he says in a friendly conversational tone that sends chills down my spine.

I like chicken, or at least I think I used to, but now that he’s said that, there’s no way I’m ordering the chicken. “I’ll have the… pork.”

“Good choice,” he says casually, and I fume inside, but outside I just reach for my drink and take another sip, staring into the lights reflected in the darkly colored liquor. He signals the waiter over and converses briefly in pidgin English. This is a tourist joint, so the waiter seems to understand. I wish I took Spanish instead of Latin. They told me it would help me on the SATs and I needed all the help I could get. But in the end, SATs meant nothing, my stats meant nothing, my workouts meant nothing, my quest to die meant nothing, all that matters is me and him, and the table between us, and the invisible chains that are keeping me bound to him in a way that no one else can see. I’m in their world, but I’m not of their world, I’m an alien, the tragedy of my presence is utterly invisible to their eyes.

“This is a beautiful country,” he says, as if he was talking to his son, or a friendly student, instead of me. I stare back at him, and the only word that comes to my mind is nonplussed. I think that summarizes how I feel right now, but I’m not sure, because it’s been a long time since I’ve seen my SAT prep notes. “I came here for the first time last year on vacation, and I was struck by how much they don’t tell us about it. It makes you wonder what else they lie to us about. 

Who is they and who is lying to him? I think he’s talking about the government. He’s managed to give me freedom in one of the only places on earth where I can’t use it, because our government has no standing here. I take another sip of the overpowering sweet alcohol and consider this new data about his relationship or lack thereof with our own government.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” he asks, prodding me with his eyes, expecting a response.

I want to rebel against him again, I want to show him that I won’t blindly do what he says, but habit kicks in. “It’s beautiful,” I echo dully. It isn’t a lie. This is the most beautiful place I’ve seen in years. And he’s brought me here after holding me prisoner in hell for all that time. What else am I supposed to say?

“A man like me doesn’t get to take many vacations,” he says. “When there’s important work to be done.”

I push the drink back across the table and fix my eyes on him. Now I feel my rebellion and my anger boiling to the surface. Important work? He sees my hostility and clicks his tongue.

“You may not understand it, Homer, but you are important. So important. What we do is important. Some day, I hope you’ll be able to understand.”

“I don’t think so,” is all that I can say. He has no idea how much I understand.

He reaches out and, with a casual knuckle, pushes the drink back in my direction. “Drink up, kid. It’s going to be a long night at this rate.”

He may not know how much I know, but he still sees right through me. Every thought that flickers across my over-stimulated brain, dulled from years of no stimulation, he can read it on my face. No one else in this restaurant sees me, no one else in the world sees me, but he does, he sees everything. I feel a curdling in my heart at the thought. He sees that, too. Of course he does.

I lift the drink from the table, because I don’t really have a choice in any of this, and sip slowly. It isn’t the worst decision I’ve ever made. My brain is whirling at a dizzying pace, and the alcohol clouds my thoughts, even makes me ever so briefly forget the horrifying fact of my captivity as I stare around the room, absorbing the loud music and the cacophony of voices and strangers.

For a moment, I can focus on the sensation, and the fear and anxiety subsides to a dull murmur that I can ignore, just for now, and focus on my sensations. I’m back in the world. There’s light and food and people and laughter. These things still exist. Life still goes on without us. When was the last time I truly laughed? I have no idea. I must have, at some point, but I don’t remember it.

“Good boy,” he says absently. I am a good boy. Too good. I hate myself for that but I am. I obey because I don’t know what else to do. “See? We can have a great time together.”

“Together?” I echo him, in disbelief. I stare down at the drink, avoiding his eye contact, to minimize my rebellion.

“I want you to have a good time tonight.”

Set me free! I want to shout, but I know I can’t, he won’t, it isn’t an option, and even if it was, now is not the time to ask him, not if I want to help the others and they’re so far away. He doesn’t really want me to have a good time, and I know that. He has other motives. Even with his invisible chains and his power, it’s still a risk, and he wouldn’t be taking the risk if there wasn’t something at the end of it all that he wanted.

I push my dish aside and set my head down on the table. I haven’t done that in years, not since playing Heads Up-Seven Up in elementary school, but it’s all I can think of to do right now to get away from him, to put my face somewhere he can’t see. When the others are around, somehow it’s easier to keep up a brave face, but without them, in this world I don’t understand, I’m a mess.

Buried in the privacy of my arms, I hurriedly wipe my eyes on my sleeves and squeeze my face, trying to stop the tears

I don’t want it to be like this. I know this could be my last glimpse of the real world, and I want to at least be able to take it in and appreciate it. I steel myself to sit back up and get through the rest of the night.

When it comes down to it, maybe I have more self-control than I expected.

I manage to keep it together until I’m talking to her on the balcony later that night, following Hap’s instructions like the good boy he keeps telling me that I am.

She tosses her head back and laughs, a musical laugh, like bells ringing out against the hot Havana night sky. I didn’t know I was so funny.

“You’re so innocent,” she says finally as she recovers.

If she only knew. I’m not innocent. Far from it. Right now I’m a guilty man, guilty of conspiring against her, guilty of betraying Prairie, guilty of plotting to take her freedom, guilty of hiding my guilt from her.

“I do, though,” I say, pressing on with my original thought. “I know where your music comes from.”

“I seriously doubt that,” she says, tipping her drink at me.

“It’s true,” I tell her softly. “I’ve been there. More than once.”

“You?” she asks, pulling back to look at me. “I don’t believe it.”

“That’s because you’re not looking at me hard enough.”

She peers closer, looking deep into my eyes, and for a moment I’m reminded of the first time Prairie told me she could see my eyes, the way she peers intently beyond the front of me, like she can see deep into my soul. I lick my lips as she studies me, and I can taste the drops of rum.

“You,” she says finally.

“We know things others don’t know,” I tell her quietly.

“Where’s your song then?” she asks, leaning into me. She’s wearing a perfume, a light one, a citrus one. It tingles my nose.

“I don’t sing,” I say. “But I know others with gifts like yours. Gifts that come from somewhere else.”

“How have you been there more than once?” she asks. “You’re barely a child.” Her hand snakes over into mine, sending a shiver down my spine at the touch of it.

“The first time was an accident,” I explain. I remember the shadows passing around me, the fear as I tried to escape, the nurse leaning over to pull the tube from my throat. “A terrible accident. The second time… well, it wasn’t an accident.”

Her fingers close around mine, and I close my eyes, wishing that her touch on mine didn’t feel so good, because she’s making it easy to do what he asked me to do, as much as I hate myself for it.

“You went there again on purpose?”

“Not… exactly,” is all that I say.

She softens, sensing correctly that I don’t want to talk about it. I break the moment by glancing over my shoulder. I don’t see Hap lurking on the other side of the restaurant, but I know he’s there. I know he’s waiting, he’s checking on us, making sure I’m doing what he expects me to do. I know that Prairie and Scott and Rachel and their lives are all on the line, but this woman, Renata – does she deserve to be one of us? Does anyone deserve to be one of us? Do we deserve it?

“Where did your name come from?” she asks, repeating it again. “Homer.”

“My mom would tell you it’s because she liked Greek mythology,” I explain. “But my dad would tell you it’s because I was supposed to play baseball.” I stop to consider this as she smiles. “Thing was, I hated baseball. I guess my dad should have named me Touchdown.”

Renata laughs at this, and again her laugh is soft and musical, cutting through the din of the guests around us. She has no idea that the mention of my parents makes a silent sob choke back in my throat. Behind her, I finally spot Hap peering around the corner, glaring at me impatiently. He wants me to get on with it. I want to freeze time right here, I don’t want to go forward, I don’t want to watch this next part.

“So American,” she says.

“Ha-ave you ever been to America?” I ask, tripping over my own words. I know she’s going to be there soon.

“No,” she says. “A man offered to take me recently.”

“Did he?” My voice squeaks a little. “Why didn’t you go?”

She shrugs. “I wasn’t interested in his offer.” 

I want to tell her that I’m the honey sent to pull her into the trap, that she should run away, but she’s slithering up beside me and oh _god_ , I want her so badly.

But is it her I want? Or is it someone else?

I picture a woman hundreds if not thousands of miles away, buried deep underground between a rock and a stream, probably lying awake right now wondering where I am and if I’m even alive.

I turn away from Renata to take a sip of my drink so she won’t see the tears welling up in my eyes yet again.

“For you, maybe I would consider it,” she says.

“Don’t,” I say suddenly.

“What?”

“Don’t consider it. Don’t come with me. Don’t listen to me. I’m a liar.”

She wrinkles her nose at me. She’s a beautiful woman, even more so when she thinks I’m being funny. “Your face is too honest.”Yeah, well, looks are deceiving. “I’m serious. You’re in danger. Stop talking to me, go find someone you trust, and get out of here right now.” I lean closer to her, so that if Hap is watching, he won’t be able to tell what I’m saying.

But her reaction gives it away. She recoils from me. “Who are you?”

“I’m a prisoner. I was sent here to make you one, too. Get the hell away from me and get out of here.”

“What?”

“Now.”

I can’t believe the words are tumbling out of my mouth with Hap so close. But all I can think about is Prairie, and that no one else deserves to be locked away like her.

“What do you mean you’re a prisoner?” she asks. “Can I help you?”

“No!” I lean in, so Hap will at least think I’m still trying. “Get away from me, fast, and don’t look back. Forget you ever met me. And go somewhere where I can’t find you again, and he can’t, either. Please.”

“Homer.” Her face softens and she reaches out to my face. I close my eyes and bite my lip. She doesn’t get it.

“Renata. Go.”

She turns abruptly, steps away from me, and she’s gone in an instant. I stand back, blinking against the lights that suddenly feel so bright in her absence. Hap is by my side within moments. 

“What just happened?” he demands. 

I shake my head. “I don’t know,” I mumble. “It must have been something I said…”

“What did you say?”

I shrug. “I told her her music was beautiful.”

“Homer. _What_ did you do?”

I stare at the ground. Maybe I made a mistake. Maybe I let an opportunity slip through our fingers. Maybe she would have been the one who made it all come together. I’ll never know.

He hates me even more than usual when we get back. He was so sure his plan was going to work, so confident in my compliance. I don’t know why. For all I know, there are a thousand other universes where I rebelled even worse than this. And maybe a thousand others where I cooperated. All I know is, he carries unusual anger when we get back, and I think it’s why Scott is dead in a matter of days.

And then there were three.

Maybe we’ll never find out anything else about the movements, or what happens when we go to the other places. We’re stuck.

I can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong, that Renata and Scott were clues to something, clues that we squandered away.

“It’s okay,” Rachel whispers to me late at night when she sees me standing at the wall staring at what used to be Scott’s cell. “He’s free now, Homer.”

And I am too, in a way. I know deep down that I only did what Scott would have done in the same situation. Now, I need him to become a part of me. In a way, he was always better than me when it came to thinking for himself. No matter how rough things got down here, no matter how little he had to look forward to in the real world, Scott was always focused on trying to get out, on trying to regain his freedom, on maintaining his independence.

Maybe by taking a little of Scott into my own soul, I can find my own independence, and my own sort of freedom.

At this point, it’s the only freedom I may ever see.


	6. Seis.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Homer faces reality at last.

SEIS.

“It’s all your fault, you know.”

Hap says those six words to me, and my whole world shifts.

From the moment I woke up and found myself on his plane, I’ve been searching frantically for escape routes. Trying to think of a way to save not just me, but my three friends, all buried deep underground somewhere where I know I can’t find them on my own. I’ve been silently complicit with him, while my head sifts through volumes of ideas, possibilities, opportunities. 

But when he speaks those six words, everything is suddenly cast askew.

“How… how is it my fault?” I manage to stammer out. 

He putters around the room, collecting anything that I could use and taking it all away – a lamp, a pad of paper, a telephone. “The experiment has changed,” he says simply. “You changed it.”

“You’re the bastard experimenting on us in the first place,” I say quietly, aggressively, but I don’t budge from where he’s seated me on the edge of the bed. I know that he’s armed, and any movement on my part could lead to my demise. I touch my forehead gingerly. Just a few minutes ago I was crying so hard in the shower that I slipped and hit my head. There’s still fresh blood. 

“Progress is unavoidable,” he says with a nonchalance that makes my blood curdle. “I thought I was experimenting to learn more about where we all go when we die. And you’ve taught me a lot. But you showed me something different. Something new. You and your determination, your courage. Now I know that we’re looking for something else. Something even bigger. Something I never could have imagined. And in order to do that, you and I both know now that we need a fifth subject.”

A subject. That’s all I am to him. That’s all I’ve ever been. Maybe sometimes I’m a rival, sometimes I’m a threat, sometimes I’m a toy, or a reluctant pet, but mostly, I’m a subject. Just another rat in his maze. And just when I think I’ve managed to chew my way through to the outside, he shows me that I never knew where I was going in the first place.

“Why me?”

“Because,” he says. “Out of all of them, you’re the one who knows as well as I do what we have to do here, and who can do it. It won’t be easy.”

I gesture a hand toward the suitcase. I know what he brought in there. “Why don’t you just gas me? We both know you can make me do whatever you want. You don’t really need my cooperation.”

“I don’t need a puppet,” he says icily. “Pinocchio is going to need to be a real boy, at least for tonight. You will do this like your life depends on it, because it does. If you want your fifth subject, if you want your movements, you will do everything I tell you to do.”

I don’t want to. I want to be the boy who runs, the boy who fights back, the boy who finds an escape. The boy who gets away and saves the day.

Scott would never comply. He wouldn’t give in. But that’s why Scott isn’t here and I am.

That’s why Scott is a better person than me.

I know Hap is right. The only real way out is through the experiment, and the only way to do that is to help him hunt down his fifth subject, whether I want to or not.

I spend the rest of the evening thinking through all the ways I could have escaped. Attacking him before he knew what was happening. Running away through the hall. Going to the front desk ( _no, he would have them covered_ ) or the business center ( _like that would work_ ). But none of them would lead me to the fifth movement. None of them would bring true freedom.

I see a familiar face, and briefly I fantasize about it being Vega, my Cuban-American football teammate from high school, but of course it isn’t Vega, there’s got to be a dozen guys just in this bar alone who look like him. I could even cooperate with him fully, capitulate and try to get him to give me everything I want, but I don’t believe any of it is possible.

The only thing that is possible, the only choice I have, is doing exactly what he wants me to do. Dully, I make my way through the evening, trying not to think about how beautiful the music is or how delicious the food is or how close I am to freedom, even when I’m so far. I feel like I’m in a different dimension from the rest of the people around me. They’re all so happy, but I know truths they’ll never know. I know how dark the world can be.

When he opens the door on our passion, I know I’m done. I look away from him, burying myself in her sweet-smelling shoulder, and though I don’t hear him quietly slip out, when I look up, he’s gone.

For some reason, he’s decided to let me have this moment. I wonder if it’s my reward for being such a good boy.

_“It’s all your fault, you know.”_

And I don’t have to do it. I can stop and call him back and let him take her in. I don’t have to commit the last sin. But all I can think about is the physical isolation of our prison, how good it feels to touch someone and to be touched. I have desires that haven’t been fulfilled, not by the long dark nights where I took care of my own needs, and I feel like I’ve earned this. And I know what’s coming for her, and maybe she needs one last night of pleasure herself.

See? I’m thinking of others… or at least I try and convince myself in that moment that I am.

The consequences don’t matter to me in that moment, though, and that’s maybe what I hate the most. I know that Renata will, of course, tell the others about my actions. I have no way of knowing what Hap will do, that the others will know exactly what choice I’d made before I even got there, that they will experience the pain of knowing immediately what I’ve done and what I’ve gotten to do. 

On the flight back, as Renata lies in the back, gassed and unresponsive, I try to think of the story I’m going to tell the others.

_“It’s all your fault, you know.”_

When we return, I’m greeted by intense hatred from all sides. I deserve it. I’ve let them all down. I’ve let myself down.

I think right then and there that I’ve hit the lowest point of my life – a prisoner, hated by my fellow prisoners. But no, I’m wrong.

The lowest moment of my life, the worst I’ve ever felt, comes later, when Hap deposits Scott’s dead body on the floor and leaves us in deep silence. His words blame OA, but that’s not how I hear it. 

_“It’s all your fault, you know.”_

OA, Rachel and Renata are there with me, of course, staring at the form that used to be Scott in utter despair, just like I am. But in spite of their companionship, I’ve never been more alone.

I know how much they all loathe me right now – even Rachel, who defended me earlier, I saw her looking at me when she thought the others weren’t watching. I know. And they’re all right to hate me. I hate myself.

I could have done something, I should have done something, and instead I capitulated. I went along with him and I cooperated. I did the thing I always swore I would never do.

Scott never gave up on trying to get out of here, even though he found it hard to believe us, even though he didn’t have much to return to. And now he’ll never get out. He’s lost the battle he was so terrified to lose, and his empty body is sprawled on the cold rock floor, with his sacrifice there for all to see.

I want to look away, but I can’t.

For years, I’ve tried to be the hero. I made myself our leader because I knew someone had to do it, and when I had the best opportunity, I failed. And now, because of me, Scott is dead, just as he told us he would be someday. Just like we all will be soon.

I don’t know what possesses me to stand up and join her in the movements. 

It’s the only thing I can think of to do. It’s the only freedom we have. It’s the only thing that could possibly get us out of here, and right now, I want to be anywhere else but here.

She hates me right now, and I silently tell her I agree, she should, because I hate myself too, and she finally forgives me, and then we’re past it, back in our shared world, moving in sync. Hour after hour, we continue moving, and I fall into a hypnotic trance, feeling the strange power of our motions moving through me. All I want is for it to heal me, to make me not be the person I just was, to put everything back together the way it should be. 

I don’t know what’s happening when I hear him gasp. At first, I wonder if I’m losing my mind. That much is a given. But I can’t believe it fully until he sits up and starts laughing. I stop and stare at him in shock.

He’s… alive.

Not only is he not dead, he’s healed. The ravage that the disease had on his body, it’s gone.

He’s free.

My life changes in that instant.

I’ve spent years bracing myself for Scott’s death. I expected it sooner or later, though I would never admit it out loud where he could hear. I know he expected it, too. I’ve known all about his disease - he never spoke the name, but I realized a long time ago what it was. And I’ve always known that Hap wasn’t getting him the treatment that he needed, and with his neglect, it would eventually come to something like this, sooner or later.

But now?

Everything has changed.

Now, we’ve become something different.

Scott isn’t sick anymore. More importantly, the man laughing on the rock floor is not the same man who came in here. As long as I’ve known him, Scott has been a man with a death sentence. Outside, drugs could have kept his T-cell count high, and prolonged his life as long as he had a steady supply, but it always would have been a shadow, a dark potential lurking in his future. In here, suddenly he has a life ahead of him that he never could have dreamed of.

He knows this too, but first he has to tell us about what happened, and what he saw, and what he learned. Putting it all together, it means we aren’t crazy. We’re right.

It’s then that I know:

We’re all going to be free someday. We just have to figure out the rest of the way together.

It’s not until hours later, after Hap takes Scott for a battery of clinical tests and then interrogates us all in turn, that OA and I finally are able to lie down on our cots, facing each other through the glass barrier.

“Homer,” she whispers. “Tell me what happened.”

I lick my lips as I think about it.

I can’t tell her the truth, not now. Not when I’ve finally redeemed myself, when we’ve finally proven once and for all what we are, when we’ve defeated Hap at his own game, I can’t tell her how weak I truly was at my lowest moment. 

_“It’s all your fault, you know.”_

I open my mouth to start.

The only question is, which lies will I tell?

EL FIN.


End file.
